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Fading Jeff Demps

August 17th, 2014

Unless Lovie Smith is hiding former Gator and Olympic speedster Jeff Demps as part of a secret plot to thrust Demps on the NFL via Jeff Tedford’s never-before-seen plays, it seems Demps is on the wrong side of the roster bubble.

Against the Dolphins last night, Demps wasn’t spotted on the field until the second half.

Demps didn’t return punts or kicks, and he was the fourth running back to handle the football.

The first Demps look of the night? He dropped a Mike Glennon pass in his hands. Demps finished the night behind the Bucs’ second- and third-team offensive lines, rushing for 31 yards and eight carries and failing to impress.

Joe’s written countless times (to the disbelief of some readers) that Demps has displayed questionable hands through the spring and summer. That showed up again tonight. Joe doesn’t care how fast Demps runs in a straight line, it’s not necessarily football speed and he’s useless if he can’t catch the football.

There’s a reason Lovie seems to have given up on Demps as a returner. Combined with his lackluster play out of the backfield, Joe wouldn’t bet on Demps lasting in Tampa until September.

19 Responses to “Fading Jeff Demps”

Joe, Tim Wright played behind all 3 other tight ends tonight. Could he be on the bubble too or was tonight more a vanilla test run for guys who may not have a nitch in a more creative system? Stocker was the #2 it seemed like.

Bad idea if we release Wright for puke stocker. But Jeff demps isn’t good no wonder bellichick traded him for lgb. Demps is good on those toss plays other then that something is missing there. He’s probably gone imo.. And @Joe any sign of space tonight? Seems like lovie wants to replace him at all cost at both kr and pr?

For a player that generated a lot of pre-season buzz, I agree, he might not be around come Sept. I thought he might be injured or something after nary a sighting in the 1st half. A 2nd half 4th team RB is not a way to make a 53 man roster. I was hoping, Demps could be a bit of a Hester type, but that seems nowhere in sight.

If Mike James is hurt enough to miss action, it might be enough to keep Demps around a little longer. Weirder things have happened. But I agree he’s not able to transfer the track speed into meaningful football ability at this level.

jOE, That was a terrible pass by Glennon nowhere by his hands, and there were 4 dolphins within 2 yards from Demps a covered man and the QB still there it.. i HAVEN’T seen enough of Demps to consider him nothing more than spot player. would like to see a screen pass from the RB position thrown to him in space.
M.James has shown the best running ability and he can catch EVERYTIME he steps on field and they should try him with first string behind Doug Martin..Um, you might want to watch the Demps drop again. –Joe

Joe,
While it appears that Demps has not impressed, I’d like to defend him just a bit by saying that Tedford is not using him correctly, at least not yet. He is not a between the tackles tailback, Tedford needs to get him the ball in space. How about a screen pass or two? With the exception of Sims in the first game, I have not seen any running back impress.

There were very few plays last night that called for getting the ball into the RBs hands in space. Hard to judge Demps off of things we already knew he couldn’t do well. That 1 pass from Glennon did bounce right off his fingers.

Demps was not used to his strength which would be in space. I don’t get the “lack of elusiveness talk,” heres why: 1) When you are that fast you don’t need a lot of shake and bake 2) when running the ball between the tackles calls for decisiveness not nimbleness. 3) he hasn’t been put in space to test his elusiveness. Other than that, I do agree he will require creativity and patients, which may be too much to ask for a team who went 4-12 last near.